Opportunities in the Technology and Life Sciences Industries to Improve Organizational Efficiency

The technology and life sciences industries, due to their continuous innovation, are poised for numerous opportunities in 2022 to improve organizational efficiency. At a recent internal EisnerAmper webinar titled Tech: Trends in Innovation and Emerging Technologies, panelists shared their insights regarding specific areas of opportunities in these industries and ways to implement changes toward improving both organizational value and efficiency.

Panelists included:

• Vince Bradley, Chief Executive Officer,Abundant IoT
• Karen Kilroy, Chief Executive Officer, Kilroy Blockchain
• Daniel Kivatinos, Co-President & Co-Founder, DrCrono

For the health care industry, medical transcription is one area that continues to see drastic improvements in terms of capture and quality. Previously, the largest improvements in this space came by way of scribes and voice dictation. As explained by Mr. Kivatinos, the industry is now seeing improvements in automatic transcription for the entirety of a patient encounter. He specified that machine learning will soon allow providers to capture a patient’s body language, such as their facial expressions or tone. Unlike the raw text captured by a scribe, non-verbal information will soon also be captured. This will allow providers to better assess a patient’s health, particularly when what is said does not align to physical cues. This kind of mismatch in a patient’s response could be assessed in real-time, allowing providers to sooner respond and capture all necessary information in forming medical conclusions.

As more and more data is captured prior to and during a patient encounter, providers will need to sift through a growing amount of information in their decision making. Artificial intelligence will allow for both the efficient capture of data as well as for highlighting to providers what is most relevant. Unusual trends in a patient’s health, like significant changes in weight or resting heart rate, as well as things that a patient may not fully be aware of, could explain to providers how or why a patient’s health may be trending in a certain direction.

The ability to capture and analyze an abundance of data can also be seen in building management. With many organizations managing a hybrid workforce, there is a growing need to properly maintain and manage the entirety of a workspace. As Mr. Bradley explained, putting sensors in and around an office building is one of the fastest growing areas, due in part to management’s recognition that office space isn’t fully utilized. Tracking electricity, HVAC utilization and even the frequency with which individual outlets are used can allow building management a more efficient snapshot of building performance. Effective management of a building by using Internet of Things (IoT) devices throughout a building’s operations creates a microgrid of efficiency whereby managers can properly identify bottlenecks or areas of wastefulness and make the necessary improvements in a timely fashion.

These opportunities for additional data capture and analysis are not fully reliable though if they are not tamper-proof. In conjunction with these new technologies, implementation of blockchain will allow for a process of data management that is both secure and auditable. Ms. Kilroy, who, like Mr. Juliano, has also achieved the designation of ‘IBM Champion,’ explained that individual organizations can have a blockchain ledger to prove their data is not tampered with. Because these organizations are capturing more data in new ways, implementing blockchain technology allows for a self-sustaining auditable process to provide secure data capture. Whether it’s a health care employee entering data or a building recording electricity use, blockchain will ensure that if data is changed, either purposefully or by accident, there exists a reliable trail to ascertain what is reliable data.

As organizations identify more areas of opportunity for value in their own operations, collaborating on developments in artificial intelligence, IoT technologies and blockchain can allow organizations to efficiently maneuver the complexities that come with an abundance of data generation. Understanding these opportunities and how to maneuver the related risks will allow companies to properly position themselves in the next phase of technological change.